The Dynamical Systems
and
Technology Project
at
Boston University

Zooming Sierpinski

This project is a National Science Foundation sponsored project
designed to help secondary school and college teachers of mathematics
bring contemporary topics in mathematics (chaos, fractals, dynamics)
into the classroom, and to show them how to use technology effectively
in this process.
At this point, there are a number of Java applets available at this
site for use in teaching ideas
concerning chaos and fractals. There are also
several interactive papers
designed to help teachers and students understand the mathematics
behind such topics as iteration, fractals,
iterated function systems (the chaos game), and the
Mandelbrot and Julia sets.

Available at this site:

Play the chaos game; explore iterated function systems; and make fractal
movies, like the Dancing Triangles and Zooming Sierpinski
above, all at your own computer.
These applets are now up and running!

This is an interactive site designed to teach the mathematics behind
the Mandelbrot and Julia sets. It consists of a series of tours in
which you will discover some of the incredibly interesting and
beautiful mathematics behind these images. The site is designed to be
used by readers of
The Mandelbrot and Julia Sets, published by Key Curriculum
Press. This site is under construction, so I welcome any comments you
have.

An interactive paper
describing some of the mathematical ideas behind Tom Stoppard's
wonderful play, Arcadia, including how young Thomasina,
then sixteen years old, discovered back in
1800
the equations for images from nature such as fractal
ferns (as shown unfolding on the left)
as well as the basic principles of chaotic dynamics.
And how, 200 years later, the mathematical biologist Valentine finally
uncovered Thomasina's amazing discoveries.

The fourteenth annual Mathematics Field Day for New England area high
school students will be held at Boston University on Tuesday, October
19 and again on Tuesday, October 26, 2004. Thanks to the over 1,000
students and teachers who attended last year. We'll be back again in late
October with the 14th annual Field Day. See you then!Hope to see you again
this year! As in previous years,
we expect these events to fill up fairly quickly.
Contact Cynthia Brossman
at cab@bu.edu
if
you and your students wish to attend.
While you're waiting for
the Field Day, have a crack at
The Fractal Quiz!!!

We have organized several Field Days at sites in California, Maine,
and Connecticut in recent years and plan to hold additional events in
the future. Let us know if you are interested in hosting such an event.

At this site you may download several spreadsheets used by Professor
Devaney
to explain such concepts as the Babylonian Method for finding square
roots, Newton's Method,
the chaos game, the logistic population model, and other topics.

This Center brings together leading scientists, educators, and technologists
from Boston University, Brandeis University, MIT, and the University of
Pennsylvania to study learning systems. There is much overlap between the
activities and goals of the Dynamical Systems and Technology Project and
CELEST.